In a period of declining state support for education, we argue S/FL teachers and teacher educators would do well to become oriented to language program preservation and advancement. We discuss three areas such an orientation could take, namely organizing, direct action, and fundraising, so that teachers and students can become more involved in decisions affecting their programs. Following a brief review of literatures in these three areas, we describe the efforts of some K-12 ESL educators in Hawai'i, who suddenly found themselves thrust into the position of defending their program from the budgetary axe. We use the experiences of these educators as a point of departure for a discussion of how a program preservation and advancement orientation could be implemented. (Contains 14 notes.)